Of Men, Gods and Power
by EagleStrike1
Summary: What happens when the whole world is made aware of the presence of assassins? When the templars reveal their true form and enslave the entire world under the one world order? A young modern assassin attempts to restore the falling assassin order while searching for a weapon that can destroy the ones who came before.
1. Chapter 1

He leaped from the branch and landed on the ground. The ice dulled the impact and any sound he could have made as he rolled into a stop. Unfortunately, his roll had sent some ice flying in the air. The man kneeling on the ground in front of him whirled around in an inhumanly quick movement and threw a knife at him with deadly precision. Only years of extensive training and lightning fast reflexes caused his hand to fly up and catch the knife in mid-air, inches away from his right eye.

"I almost had you" he said to the man.

"If it wasn't for the ice, you did have me. But it's a fuck-up nonetheless. You didn't mind the environment and if I were an enemy, I would be using a 45, not a knife" the man replied in a scornful voice.

"And if I were an enemy, I'd be dead. I'm not, though, so can we just move on? I thought I'd mess with you a little, clearly I shouldn't have. It's not like you could have actually become a cool person to hang out with right?" he shot back.

Muttering words like "undisciplined" and "sloppy" the man led him through the dark woods, their breaths puffing in the cold air.

"So, what's the urgency? I don't think you called me here to have a nice walk in the woods."

"No" the man replied.

"Wanna enlighten me Harley?"

Harley looked at him as if he were deciding whether or not to tell him. He walked on for a full minute peeking at his GPS before replying,

"My team's being watched somehow. I'm pretty sure it's not a mole but I'm not entirely sure it's not either. I took to the rooftops at the edge of the town to lose them. If anyone's following me, we'll lead them straight to a little clearing that's a mile ahead of us and set up an ambush. Also my team needs some firepower. We've got 2 AKs and an MP5, 3 Glocks and suppressors at the hideout. If a strike team has been watching us, it's not gonna be of much use. I need 2 high caliber sniper rifles, at least a dozen assault rifles with suppressors and around 2 dozen USP and Beretta handguns. If push comes to shove, my team will have to make a quick escape."

"Maybe you shouldn't have left your team then. I could have reached the hideout myself. Anyways, I almost managed to sneak a handgun in. They almost busted it so I ditched it in the last second though. Since when did railway security get so tight? I swear one of them was actually expecting to find something illegal in there. He was going through the luggage quite thoroughly. Which reminds me, I need a gun and a knife. I'm not carrying anything with me. And about your gun crisis, there's a dealer at the port who specializes in supplying high caliber weapons. I can hook you up with him if you want. You got cash? He only takes cash."

They reached a deserted, broken down church. "I've got some cash. It'll be enough, I think. Alright here we are. See the bell up there? It seems like a proper vantage point. I'll see if there's a way up to it inside the church, I don't wanna press my luck on the ladder, it seems worn out. Here – I don't have extra mags, but the gun's got 7 rounds, make em' count." Harley said as he passed him a Desert Eagle with a suppressor and made his way inside the church. He looked at Harley's figure disappear inside the church.

The church's entrance was broken down and the wooden door was lying on the ground, unhinged and rotting to pieces. He climbed up the stairs and entered the threshold. Harley was some 20 feet ahead, tapping some window sills to see if they would hold up his weight.

"So I heard Bill's back. What's he up to? Haven't heard from him in a long time. How is he anyway? Desmond's death put him down hard…."

"Bill's okay I guess. I haven't talked to him. I heard he's in Nepal, laying low for a while in the Himalayas, enjoying the air, you know…"

Harley seemed to be analyzing this info. "I wanted to talk to him privately. Any chance I can get a secure connection? You know his exact location?" he asked.

"Himalayas. That's all I know." he replied.

"The Templars are about to launch the Animus Omega console, we're treading on thin ice here. If you know his exact location, tell me." Harley persisted.

He looked at Harley for a while. And then he gave him the co-ordinates. Harley nodded and turned around, making a note perhaps, on his phone. He stowed the phone in his pocket, whipped out a Colt Anaconda and turned around to draw the gun on him – only he wasn't there anymore. Harley pressed himself to the back of the church wall and focused his mind. Like a trigger going off, his Eagle vision activated. He was a foot away from his right – the man he once saw as a friend, an ally, now unmistakably an enemy, highlighted in Red. Too late. Even as Harley turned around to get good aim, he was disarmed. The revolver flew several feet into the air and landed just a foot from the threshold. He dodged the next punch and sidestepped, running across the church towards his gun. Only his assassin training helped him dodge the tackle that followed. His path was blocked, Harley had no option but to fight. He lunged with grace at his opponent, fists out. He blocked his punch, feigned right and kneed him in the abdomen. Before Harley recovered, he kicked him on his face. Nose bleeding, Harley scrambled up to his feet, but he was dazed. A hand-to-hand combat would surely leave him dead, his opponent was known to have been trained in extremely rare form of martial arts. He dodged as his opponent tried to grab him, shoved him against a bench which he toppled over and lunged towards the gun, 5 feet away.

"Stop!"

Harley laughed as he heard him put off the safety lock.

"It's full of dummy bullets." He laughed as he turned around, the revolver in his hand.

A single gunshot exploded in the still night. Harley's smile froze as the bullet pierced his abdomen. He dropped the gun.

"But-but….. I…..the bullets were…they" he gasped through pain.

"You should have known better than to hand me a gun with dummy bullets. I've carried a Desert Eagle for years, you think I wouldn't have known that the gun weighed lighter? In any case, I wasn't convinced with your act. I knew you were leading me to the church for a reason." He replied, a SIG Sauer in hand, aimed straight at Harley.

"Little Kyle Praetor. You've actually outsmarted me. How did you know?" Harley asked, kneeling on the ground, clutching the gunshot wound.

Kyle walked up to him, picked up the Colt revolver and stowed his SIG inside his jacket.

"Well the train station was a dead giveaway. I told no one but you that I was coming via train. You told security was tight. So I hacked into the server and looked through some old security camera tapes of the station. It was clear that you were about to set me up since I never saw security like you described. I decided train travel was too risky. So I stole a car and got in through the highway. When I met you, you already seemed nervous. One of the advantages of having Eagle sense is it is evolved above Eagle vision, unlike you, I can see people's heartbeats, not just friend or foe. You are a good liar, but you slipped up in places, I saw the irregular ups and downs in your heart." Kyle replied as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

"But that's not conclusive, you couldn't have known, not so easily…." Harley struggled to understand.

"I didn't. You checked your GPS and said the clearing was a mile ahead. So I mentioned that I wasn't carrying any weapons. You were so relieved that you decided to end me as soon as possible. We hadn't walked 20 feet when you said the church was it. You slipped up on your own words. Like that weren't obvious enough, you asked me for Bill's exact location. Amateur work Harley. I was packing the gun in case I ran into a situation like this, I just never expected you as a mole." Kyle explained

"Well, I had you all fooled hadn't I? The Templars promised me power when the assassins couldn't. They had a lot to offer… in any case, I dedicated myself to this cause and in the end I was stuck chaperoning a bunch of amateurs and historians while kids like you rose to power, controlling entire branches of the order. What was I to do? Just roll over and play nanny? I'm not made that way… doesn't matter now…." Harley replied.

"No, it doesn't. You would have thrown your friends under the bus instead of reaching out. We can't guarantee a private island to spend retirement in or private hangars and stuff like that, but we had freedom, we were fighting the good cause. You just couldn't see past yourself. Now it's brought your demise. Rest in Peace." And then he raised the gun again, pointed it on Harley's forehead. Before Harley could protest he pulled the trigger.

As Harley crumpled, he bent down and closed his eyes.

An hour later, with Harley's body safely buried in the woods, Kyle picked up the phone Harley had. He had simply noted the location. He would have a hacker look through it later just in case, but he wasn't worried. The location was a fake one, a dead end. Kyle looked at the sky, wondering about the loyalties of men and their greed for power.

Slowly, he made his way down the icy hill, humming a song.


	2. Chapter 2

Hey Guys! Sorry about the previous chapter. I know it doesn't really explain the story described in the description, but I simply wrote that chapter to build the character and the story. This chapter will explore more on how the Templars plan to take the world under control and how the people from the first civ fit in. This chapter is my view on how the Templars would conquer the world. It's a little far-fetched, but please be kind. I used some context from the end of AC : The L-11 is a virus introduced in the AC universe in modern times. Enjoy and leave feedbacks. Cheers!

Laetitia England looked around the table. The people around the table looked at her eagerly. This was big news, quite possibly the biggest news in the past decade, counting aside the Great Purge. The grandmaster had specifically asked her to pass along this news. The analysis was detailed, the plan was a little weak in places, but it was pretty solid, after 9 or 10 months and they would be able to implement it. She cleared her throat and began,

"Good morning ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the inner sanctum. This room was designed almost a century ago. Very few people have been in here, so consider yourself lucky. The Grandmaster sends his regards, he couldn't attend this meeting due to an urgent issue that demands his attention. He asked me to pass along this news, along with the detailed report to all of you through a secure channel of communication. Our servers are constantly under attack from multiple organizations, especially the assassins. Which is why I've decided to pass along this report in paper, through heavily secured courier systems. Please note that these are delicate documents with detailed info about our secret operations, so please handle these documents with extreme care. Now, back to the issue.

Our latest project is codenamed Eden. This is quite possibly the biggest undertaking of the modern Templar order. The assassin order is weak and vulnerable. Thanks to Mr Otso Berg, we've located multiple assassin cells around the world. Our strike teams are raiding these cells as we speak. We intercepted a message from Gavin Banks, ordering assassins to go into hiding. With the state of things, we are at the greatest strategic advantage to begin Project Eden.

The L-11 virus caused the greatest pandemic in history, it wiped out 96% of the African population. The entire continent is still almost entirely deserted. Abstergo Industries has received permission from the UN to begin decontamination of the continent. We have secretly deployed a team of engineers to locate and design a secret military bunker in the continent. Our top scientists have been studying the L-11 virus and assure us that within the next few months, they will be able to create an evolved, tougher and deadlier strain of the L-11 virus. This new strain can be weaponized into missiles. A Weapon of Mass Destruction without the destruction. It's subtle and can be programmed to target a specific Gene-pool or a single DNA structure. Our satellite is being updated by engineers to carry a miniature missile silo, allowing us to launch weaponized super viruses from space, targeting world leaders and politicians alike. The satellite will be launched within the next 7 months. The G8 is facing turmoil, with the World leaders focused on saving the economy, we've managed to place Templars in the government. They are strategically capable of authorizing wars, influencing economies and have the ears of the presidents of the respective countries. So far, we have control of World politics and WMDs of world powers.

Terrorist organizations around the world are spreading chaos and terror. The military has so far been unable to quell these acts of terror. The UN has also provided us permission to create a military force. Mercenary organizations like Black water have agreed to merge their military force with Abstergo's military. The best and promising recruits will be trained in our secret bunker in Africa. Already, we have over 300 active strike teams placed around the world. A flicker of Assassin activity and our forces will be upon them instantly.

The Animus program is a hit with the public, people have so far enjoyed our products. The few and rare users with traces of First Civilization DNAs are being blocked from our access by the assassins. But with the launch of our new security system, hackers shouldn't be a problem. We'll soon stumble upon a precursor site, hopefully a Piece of Eden. With these First Civilization Technologies on our hands, we will be practically unstoppable. We're currently backing multiple Military generals around the world to organize a coup. Once the true terror sets in across the world, the most essential phase of Project Eden begins. Templar leaders will introduce the idea of the Templar Order. We will not reveal the true nature of our order of course, simply plant the idea. At this point, the people will be desperate for any form of change. This is when Abstergo Industries will back up the new form of governance. With Abstergo's brand, the people will gladly accept the Templar governance. As we gradually gain control of the most powerful nations, we will launch military around the world to quell acts of rebellion, which will be provoked by the assassins of course. In the third phase of Project Eden, we will publicly reveal the nature of the assassin order, casting their ideals as acts of terrorism. If the third phase of Project Eden works properly, we will permanently exterminate the assassin order and their ideas. With the assassins gone, we will bring society under a new era of order and peace, a true return to Eden. And thus, Project Eden."

Laetitia finished the briefing, her head spinning, nervous. The Templars around the table looked at one another, dumbstruck perhaps until Alan Rikkin stood up. He walked up to Laetitia, took her hand and kissed the Templar ring on her hand. He smiled a sinister smile as he looked around the table. He picked up a glass of champagne from the table, raised it in his hand and said,

"To a new, assassin free One World Order! May the Father of Understanding Guide Us!"

The Templars around the table stood up. Surrounded by tumultuous applause, Laetitia England raised her own glass and toasted,

" May the Father Of Understanding Guide Us!"


End file.
